Is Thanksgiving as a holiday doomed to oblivion? Or will only the name be changed to something more appropriate for our changed nation and society?

I oft times wonder how long it can be before someone, somewhere will take to the American courts to have the national Thanksgiving holiday declared unconstitutional. After all, giving thanks for blessings is an act of supplication to the Almighty, an act that has been publicly banned now for a long time in our secular society.

However, the feeling of gratitude has been a part of our national character since its very founding. After the Declaration of Independence, the American Congress proclaimed days of fasting and of thanksgiving annually throughout the Revolutionary War. The first proclamation by Congress was dated May 17, 1776, calling for a “day of Humiliation, Fasting and Prayer” throughout the colonies. Congress urged fellow citizens to “confess and bewail our manifold sins and transgressions, and by a sincere repentance and amendment of life, appease his [God’s] righteous displeasure, and through the merits and mediation of Jesus Christ, obtain his pardon and forgiveness.” Massachusetts ordered a “suitable Number” of the proclamations printed so “that each of the religious Assemblies in this Colony, may be furnished with a Copy of the same” and added the motto “God Save This People” as a substitute for “God Save the King.”

Good news, Aljazeera Television now available in the English language!

More good news! Canada – you are not a part of ‘America’; nor is Mexico. “Death to America” means only ‘Death to the United States.’ Keep on keeping on with the peace keeping, Canada. When we real ‘Americans’ are all dead, you peaceful countries will have the entire continent to yourselves … and the Aljazeera Peacekeepers.

– Democrats push for Iraq withdrawal
Democrats, who won a majority in the US Congress in last week, say they will push for a phased withdrawal of US troops from Iraq to begin in four to six months.

Senator Carl Levin, a Michigan Democrat, who is expected to be chairman of the Senate armed services committee in the new Congress, said: “The first order of business is to change the direction of Iraq policy. We need to begin a phased redeployment of forces from Iraq in four to six months,” he said.

More Proof: From Iran’s Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei: “it is the defeat of Bush’s hawkish policies in the world.”

Representative Charles Rangel, a soon-to-be powerful member of the new Democrat-controlled congress, was quoted in “The New York Times” saying: “Mississippi gets more than their fair share back in federal money, but who the hell wants to live in Mississippi?”

A Mississippi congressman is fuming and wants to know if insults are what Mississippi should expect when Democrats take over leadership in Congress.

Kerfuffles answers “Of course they are.” And not only Mississippi, but the entire South will be the brunt of such insults, and that is why Rangel used the plural pronoun ‘their’ for Mississippi, instead of the proper grammar ‘its’, as he was really speaking of all Southern states. It is what is known as Southern bigotry, and it is the only bigotry still acceptable in these ‘progressive’ United States of America.

The American voters have spoken overwhelmingly, and this is the behavior they desire in their nation’s political leaders. Quite perplexing a development it be, considering that back in March of this year, 86% of these same Americans wanted to split the country in two: Blue and Red America.

Rangel said he didn’t intend to insult the state, but Rep. Chip Pickering, R-Miss., issued a sharp statement criticizing the choice of words.

Elbert Garcia, a Rangel spokesman in New York, sent The Associated Press a response from Rangel: “I certainly don’t mean to offend anyone. I just love New York so much that I can’t understand why everyone wouldn’t want to live here.”

The Times article was about the political clout gained by the New York congressional delegation in the midterm elections. Rangel is the ranking Democrat on Ways and Means and is in line to become chairman of the powerful tax-writing committee. He said, among other things, that he wants to direct more federal money to his state.

Expect to even hear the implied slur “Redneck” slip out occasionally too. “Who Are Rednecks” anyway?

There has been a long, ongoing quest within the community of Canadian Vietnam veterans to have the deaths of their comrades-in-arms formally remembered by the Canadian government on occasions such as Canada’s Remembrance Day. This quest continues.

On Canada’s Remembrance Day of 2005, the Canadian government had absolutely no sentiments of gratitude for the 20,000 or so fellow Canadians who served, nor for the more than 100 young Canucks who died, fighting for freedom and against communism during the Vietnam War.

Flowery words were spoken about brave soldiers who fought and died in World War I and World War II and the Korean War, but there were no words spoken about the long, bloody Cold War conflict known as the Vietnam War. Ambassadors from many nations, including former enemy nations, were invited to lay wreaths in commemoration of the sacrifices made by those who died in Canada’s 20th century wars, including Americans who chose to fight in the uniform of a foreign country, Canada. They, along with Canadian soldiers, were honored on Canada’s Remembrance Day. However, Canada refused to honor and respect the thousands of its own citizens who crossed the border to don the military uniform of the United States of America and fight against the world-wide scourge of communism during the Cold War.

However, when one visits the Veterans Affairs Canada website, there is this explanation of “Canada’s Day of Remembrance”:

Every year on November 11, Canadians pause in a silent moment of remembrance for the men and women who have served, and continue to serve our country during times of war, conflict and peace. We honour those who fought for Canada in the First World War (1914-1918), the Second World War (1939-1945), and the Korean War (1950-1953), as well as those who have served since then. More than 1,500,000 Canadians have served our country in this way, and more than 100,000 have died. They gave their lives and their futures so that we may live in peace.

The following is from an essay by Earl McRae that appeared in “The Ottawa Sun” of 11 November 2005:

There’ll be words spoken in the cold November air about our brave soldiers who fought and died in World War I and World War II and the Korean War, but there’ll be no words spoken about the long and terrible and bloody conflict known as the Vietnam War. There’ll be invited ambassadors with wreaths for the laying from countries that are our military allies, and from countries that were once our military enemies. There’ll be invited military personnel from countries that are our allies, and from countries that were once our enemies.

It will not be mentioned that among those whose sacrifice is being commemorated, who fought and who died in Canada’s 20th century wars, were Americans; Americans who chose to fight in the uniform of another country, our country. They, too, are being honoured this morning by Canada, but Canada is not honouring, and has not respected, the thousands of young Canadians who crossed the border to sign up for the Vietnam War wearing the uniform of the United States of America.

103 Canucks died in ‘Nam

It will not be mentioned that on the memorial in Washington, D.C., The Wall, with the names of the more than 58,000 U.S. soldiers killed in the Vietnam War, are the names of the 103 Canadians also killed.

It will not be mentioned that Canada, neutral in the Vietnam War, permitted some 30,000 American draft dodgers into the country as landed immigrants, along with numerous military deserters.

It will not be mentioned that Canada, the Canada who said Canadians signing with U.S. forces for Vietnam was a violation of Canada’s Foreign Enlistment Act of 1937 disallowing Canadians to serve in the military of a country at war with a nation Canada has no quarrel with, is the same and hypocritical Canada whose economy profited from the war by the sale to the American military between 1968 and 1973 of $2.7 billion worth of war materiel from guns to grenades to aircraft engines to military vehicles to boots to berets to napalm.

It will not be mentioned that Canada, who wouldn’t send troops, Canada, who opposed Canadians joining the U.S. military to fight, is the Canada whose delegates to the various peace commissions willingly undertook spy work for the CIA, helped the Americans to secretly bring more troops and arms into South Vietnam, helped the U.S. keep the chemical defoliant program from the public, permitted the U.S. military to test Agent Orange destined for Vietnam at Camp Gagetown, N.B., permitted U.S. bombers to practise their carpet-bombing runs near Suffield, Alta., and North Battleford, Sask.

The Canadian Vietnam Veterans Association, with branches across Canada, has not been invited to the Remembrance Day service this morning. If the association, or any individual Canadian Vietnam vets, wish to use the War Memorial for wreath laying to honour their Canadian comrades, along with our soldiers in all the wars, they will have to do so detached from the official ceremony and — as they have in the past — when eyes are looking the other way.

Along the Detroit River in Windsor, Ontario, there is a small, privately funded monument to those Canadians killed in the Vietnam War, The North Wall. When surviving Canadian veterans returned home to Canada from the battlefields of Asia, they encountered a nation that had changed dramatically into a society that was strongly anti-war, anti-Vietnam veteran and pro draft-dodgers and military deserters. With no veterans groups to assist them, nor any help whatsoever from the Canadian government, many of these Vietnam vets relocated permanently to the United States.

Will Remembrance Day 2006 be any different? We shall see and we shall report it here.

The Firefox geeks have managed to concoct a version of Firefox that self-destructs. If you are a user of the Firefox browser, do not download the latest version, Firefox 2.0, as I did. Now, after using the Firefox browser exclusively for years, I am left with a burned out shell of a browser.

First of all, my bookmarks disappeared, for no reason at all. I finally did find them secreted away in my hidden profile folder, but they will no longer display on my tool bar. I have followed all the “conflicting” tutorials available at the Firefox site and nothing has worked. After hours of troubleshooting, I noticed that there are no more widgets or plug-ins on my desktop screen. Everything has disappeared; my RSS feeds, all my plug-ins that I depended upon, my live bookmarks, my entire Internet life, so why bother using Firefox anymore?

I’m not! I took a look at the new Internet Explorer and I like what I see. Right now I am in the process of switching to Opera which I have used occasionally. I am rebuilding my bookmarks and downloading widgets there, so it should be a good replacement for Firefox.

The Firefox geeks destroyed that browser with the Firefox 2.0 upgrade. It went out in a blaze, but not a blaze of glory. Sad indeed.

2005 to date, by Kerfuffles.
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